Sen. Elizabeth Warren cited recent Pew Research Center polling that found only 18% of Americans say they can trust the U.S. government to do the right thing to unveil her Anti-Corruption and Public Integrity Act on Tuesday, in a speech at the National Press Club.

The Massachusetts Democrat advocates a lifetime ban on lobbying by former members of Congress, Presidents, and agency heads and banning foreign lobbying and lobbyists donations to candidates and members of Congress. “The trial of Donald Trump’s campaign manager has exposed how foreign governments hide their efforts to influence the American government through lobbying. We should ban Americans from getting paid to lobby for foreign governments—period. If foreign governments want to express their views, they can use their diplomats,” said Warren.

Warren’s bill seeks to eliminate both the appearance and the potential for financial conflicts of interest by banning members of Congress, cabinet secretaries, federal judges, and other senior government officials from owning and trading individual stock, including requiring the Supreme Court follow the ethics rules applicable to all other federal judges.

She also advocates “locking the government-to-lobbying revolving door” and eliminating the “golden parachutes” that companies pay some executives when they enter public service, citing the instance of Goldman Sachs
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paying Gary Cohn more than $250 million when he left the firm to lead President Trump’s National Economic Council.

Warren’s legislation also aims to end what she characterizes as the corporate capture of public interest rulemaking by requiring disclosure of funding or editorial conflicts of interest when corporations and special interest groups pay for comments and studies that support rulemaking.

Warren also advocates requiring elected officials and candidates for federal office to disclose more financial and tax information and making federal contractors – including private prisons and immigration detention centers – comply with federal open records laws.

The proposed legislation is a wish list for comprehensive anti-corruption legislation that wraps in several proposals made in the last few years by Warren and Democratic colleagues like Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin. Baldwin teamed up with Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland to propose anti- revolving door and anti- golden parachute legislation in 2015. Warren herself co-sponsored legislation in June to amend the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 to provide for additional disclosure requirements for corporations, labor organizations, and Super PACs.

Asked after the speech how she can be optimistic she can make these changes given the current political environment, Warren responded that the Women’s March response to Trump’s inauguration was very inspiring and that the movement has grown, and protests over Trump’s immigration changes and the Parkland shooting were “moments in America” that can be supported by naming the problem, corruption.

She mentioned her nemesis, Mick Mulvaney, who heads the Office of Management and Budget and changed the name of the consumer protection agency she founded as interim director. She brought up the controversy over his remarks to the American Bankers Association conference where she says Mulvaney told bankers about a rule he had as a Congressman: “if a lobbyist didn’t give him money, the lobbyist didn’t get a meeting—he met only with those lobbyists who ponied up for his campaign war chest.”

Warren was asked by a reporter from Investment News if she thought that the “revolving door” and regulatory capture was impacting the SEC’s decision about the fiduciary rule for investment advisors. “Of course it has!”

“Who do you think is in there talking to the SEC about what they want?,” she asked the audience rhetorically.

When asked to mention some Democrats who are part of the problem, since her prepared remarks only mentioned Republicans like Mulvaney, Warren mentioned Mary Jo White, former SEC chairwoman who worked on Wall Street. White, officially an independent, was nominated by President Barack Obama.

“She comes into SEC, never completes the rules about corporate campaign contributions,” and then goes back out to a law firm defending white-collar clients, she responds.

Warren is considered a likely contender to seek the Democratic nomination for president in 2020. A poll conducted in late June by Harvard CAPS/Harris’s found her fourth, trailing former Vice President Joe Biden, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders.

Francine
McKenna

Francine McKenna is a MarketWatch reporter based in Washington, covering financial regulation and legislation from a transparency perspective. She has written about accounting, audit, fraud and corporate governance for publications including Forbes, the Financial Times, Accountancy and the American Banker. McKenna had 30 years of experience at banks and professional-services firms, including at PwC and KPMG, before becoming a full-time writer.

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